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1st time BBB with new pool finish

Ok so I delt with my problems of yesteryear and basically had to get my pool resurfaced. I went with pebble sheen, water has been in the pool for about 6 days. After the pool company did my 1st chemicals I got readings of this (I have added no chemicals between readings)

11500 gallons

5/27
FC 4ppm
CC .5
TC 4.5
PH 7.2
TA 110
CYA 58

5/31
FC 0
CC 0
TC 0
PH 8.2
TA 110
CYA 40

I used the pool calculator and dumped in about 45oz of bleach and put some tabs in my floater. The pool calculator confuses me because it uses chemical names and not the BBB (3B's). The calc told me to ad 21oz of M/Acid, 72oz of bleach and 15oz of stabilizer. I would put in some 20 mule Borax but my PH is already high. Basically any help getting me started and reading the pool calculator would be awesome! thanks! Im using the big tf-100 fyi

Re: 1st time BBB with new pool finish

Lower the PH to 7.2 with muriatic acid, and don't add any more borax for the foreseeable future. Every time PH goes above 7.8, lower it back down to 7.2. That will probably means daily acid additions, though perhaps only every other day.

The PH, TA, and CH levels are all going to go up fairly rapidly for the first three or four weeks and then more slowly for up to a year.

You can keep using trichlor for a little longer, but very soon you are going to need to switch to using bleach because the CYA level is coming up fairly quickly.

Re: 1st time BBB with new pool finish

thanks for the quick reply Jason. So when should I use Borax? what kinda of levels would I see effected by the Borax? I will go add some M/acid right now persay the pool calculator. I want to use the BBB exclusively tho i put in the tabs today, I was just trying to get the TC up and level out.

Re: 1st time BBB with new pool finish

Borax is optional. You can add it whenever, or never. But you don't want to start messing around with it until you get the rest of the numbers in range and relatively stable. It will just add one more variable you don't need right now.

Right now you need to get pH under control and get some chlorine in that pool before it turns green. And watch that CYA- the only way to get rid of it if you add too much is by draining and refilling.

16K freeform gunite with spa; Pentair 4000 DE filter; Century Whisperflow 1 HP; Pentair Minimax heater.Troublefree does not mean Maintenancefree. It's like brushing your teeth: You can spend a couple minutes a day and pennies a week or go to the dentist once a year and spend several thousand dollars.A pool is like a pet - you have to feed it every day, even the days you don't want to play with it!

Re: 1st time BBB with new pool finish

Right now, the PH is going to be constantly going up. If the PH somehow gets too low, just wait an hour. In several weeks, when the PH increases slow down, borax will be useful if you need to raise the PH for some reason, but right now it just means adding more acid to get the PH back down.

Re: 1st time BBB with new pool finish

Ok so it sounds like right now i need to worry mostly about Chlorine and PH (checking cya and ta as well) as the pool water is fresh there is nothing built up in the water. As a result it is very volatile to swings in PH?

today i was @

FC 3
CC .5
TC 3.5
PH 7.4
TA 100
CYA 40

I added chem's at 4-430pm so we will see what the days son does to the pool that time today.

Re: 1st time BBB with new pool finish

Chlorine is right on the borderline. I would add a little more.

16K freeform gunite with spa; Pentair 4000 DE filter; Century Whisperflow 1 HP; Pentair Minimax heater.Troublefree does not mean Maintenancefree. It's like brushing your teeth: You can spend a couple minutes a day and pennies a week or go to the dentist once a year and spend several thousand dollars.A pool is like a pet - you have to feed it every day, even the days you don't want to play with it!

Re: 1st time BBB with new pool finish

Richard320, remember fresh plaster only a week ago. Not a big deal, but because of that it is alright to go a little easy on the chlorine, or raise it a little but not raise it a lot.

The PH won't swing around much, it is just going to go up and up for a couple of weeks yet (aside from when you lower it with acid). Fresh plaster will always raise the PH rapidly for the first three or four weeks and more slowly for up to a year. This has nothing to do with the pool just being filled, it is because of the fresh plaster.

Re: 1st time BBB with new pool finish

The floater will add CYA, which isn't bad for now, as you can use a little bit more. But the pucks also drive pH down, as you can see. If you have a spa or waterfall, run the return water through them to aerate, that should get pH up. If you don't have those features, try aiming your return jets up. Or search "aerator" and look in the threads with paperclips next to the subject line, they'll have pictures of some clever homemade aerators.

16K freeform gunite with spa; Pentair 4000 DE filter; Century Whisperflow 1 HP; Pentair Minimax heater.Troublefree does not mean Maintenancefree. It's like brushing your teeth: You can spend a couple minutes a day and pennies a week or go to the dentist once a year and spend several thousand dollars.A pool is like a pet - you have to feed it every day, even the days you don't want to play with it!

Re: 1st time BBB with new pool finish

Hello Taxidermist~~

Congratulations on your new PebbleSheen.

What test kit are you using? You have not mentioned a Calcium Hardness reading. Looking at your posts and seeing incremental CYA readings of 33 and 58, I'm guessing that your having your water tested at the pool store?

You need a good test kit to take proper care of your pool!

Also it can't hurt for you to visit PebbleTec.com and read what they have to say on the Service and Support page of their website.